The Twins Are About to Lose Their MVP. They Must Get Something in Return.

[Greglw3]

2 hours ago, TheLeviathan said:

I don't believe Zoll is the one to point the finger at.  The time honored tradition is for our GMs to fall on the sword and say it was them, but time and time again we find out the real culprits are the owners.

It's been this way since at least Ryan if not further back.

I agree, Zoll took at 22 games below .500 team to one that’s only 7 below and has a bright future with Jenkins, Culpepper, Lee, Rodriguez, Keaschall, Houston, Lackey, Bradley, Prielipp, Abel, Lopez, Ryan, maybe Roden, Gonzalez or Mendez and young pitching. They need to re-sign Jeffers and Minter and try to extend Ryan.

They need to sign a solid starter in free agency. I think Zoll has done an admirable job as has Shelton and Hawkins and Sizemore.

[Mike Sixel]

43 minutes ago, Greglw3 said:

I agree, Zoll took at 22 games below .500 team to one that’s only 7 below and has a bright future with Jenkins, Culpepper, Lee, Rodriguez, Keaschall, Houston, Lackey, Bradley, Prielipp, Abel, Lopez, Ryan, maybe Roden, Gonzalez or Mendez and young pitching. They need to re-sign Jeffers and Minter and try to extend Ryan.

They need to sign a solid starter in free agency. I think Zoll has done an admirable job as has Shelton and Hawkins and Sizemore.

All those players were acquired by Falvey. Hoffman and Kremer by Zoll.

[MeleMouth]

8 hours ago, chpettit19 said:

Fully on board. Shoot, I'd add a Pratt style extension for Houston to the list. But that is not the same as what people are talking about for Jeffers. Nobody was calling for a Jeffers extension until 2023 at the earliest. When he established himself.

Edited to add: The Bradley deal actually would be more like the Jeffers situation. Nobody was calling for a Taj extension this offseason. Or at least very few would have been. But now he's established and the extension is not so easy to execute. Like not wanting Jeffers extended until he broke out. And then the player can see the massive check at the end of the rainbow. Keaschall is pretty close to this, too.

Well, in the Twins' defense, they did do an extension with Dobnak before he proved himself.

And the Buxton contract was a really smart balancing of risks and payoff for a great, but often injured player, which the team probably wouldn't have gotten but for Buxton's desire to play here, but some people still hate it.

[JCT66]

15 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Ownership doesn't extend QO's. The front office does, but they haven't had a player on the roster worth a QO under Falvinezoll. Says a lot about them, really. Wasn't Jake Odorizzi the last? But he was coming off a 4.3 WAR campaign

Sonny Gray received a qualifying offer. 
 

i can’t believe this is actually in question.  The Twins will obviously make the qualifying offer to Jeffers. I don’t know if he will accept it or not, but I would be absolutely shocked if the Twins don’t make the offer. 

[bean5302]

28 minutes ago, JCT66 said:

Sonny Gray received a qualifying offer. 
 

i can’t believe this is actually in question.  The Twins will obviously make the qualifying offer to Jeffers. I don’t know if he will accept it or not, but I would be absolutely shocked if the Twins don’t make the offer. 

Guess I forgot about Gray. Sure, the Twins can make a QO to every single pending free agent on the roster. It's guaranteed draft picks!

[TheLeviathan]

3 hours ago, Greglw3 said:

I agree, Zoll took at 22 games below .500 team to one that’s only 7 below and has a bright future with Jenkins, Culpepper, Lee, Rodriguez, Keaschall, Houston, Lackey, Bradley, Prielipp, Abel, Lopez, Ryan, maybe Roden, Gonzalez or Mendez and young pitching. They need to re-sign Jeffers and Minter and try to extend Ryan.

They need to sign a solid starter in free agency. I think Zoll has done an admirable job as has Shelton and Hawkins and Sizemore.

I'm also not trying to credit him.  At this point he's a non-factor in the current predicament IMO.

[old nurse]

22 hours ago, Glorybound said:

This was the deal they made when they went all in. Time to pay the piper. I don’t see a qualifying offer as a possibility. Their roster is not set for offering a long term contract. So that option seems very unlikely.

They went all in, for a Jim Pohlad team, in 23, adding 8 million to a low underfunded team should not be construed as going all in

[old nurse]

7 hours ago, Mike Sixel said:

All those players were acquired by Falvey. Hoffman and Kremer by Zoll.

Falvey wasn’t involved  in the 26 draft. 

[old nurse]

Interesting all of the love Jeffers is getting versus what got shoved Buxton’s way Jeffers has played less games so far this year than Buxton has. Why he wasn’t traded was likely there was nothing offered that the Twins, or any other team than Miami would want.  

The qualifying offer might be almost as much as a 2 years of pay for a part time player. Willson Contreras an Realmuto were the only 2 big catcher contracts given out. Jeffers isn’t either of them 

[TNtwins85]

22 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Ownership doesn't extend QO's. The front office does, but they haven't had a player on the roster worth a QO under Falvinezoll. Says a lot about them, really. Wasn't Jake Odorizzi the last? But he was coming off a 4.3 WAR campaign

Sonny Grey. ‘23

[HarmonK03]

9 hours ago, Greglw3 said:

I agree, Zoll took at 22 games below .500 team to one that’s only 7 below and has a bright future with Jenkins, Culpepper, Lee, Rodriguez, Keaschall, Houston, Lackey, Bradley, Prielipp, Abel, Lopez, Ryan, maybe Roden, Gonzalez or Mendez and young pitching. They need to re-sign Jeffers and Minter and try to extend Ryan.

They need to sign a solid starter in free agency. I think Zoll has done an admirable job as has Shelton and Hawkins and Sizemore.

This roster was constructed by Falvey with help from Zoll.  Falvey didn't leave until right before spring training..  And the moves Zoll has made during the season have done nothing to improve the team.  Our record is worse since the trade deadline and he has carried Jackson on the roster for the last two months for no reason.

[mikelink45]

22 hours ago, chpettit19 said:

What extension could have been done? Are there reports out there about Jeffers being open to an extension and the Twins refusing to do it? I never understand this stance that the FO screwed up by not doing an extension. The players have free will. They're allowed to say no to any extension offer. The Twins could certainly offer obvious overpays that would give them a good chance at getting the player to sign, but the reason they're called overpays is because they're paying more than they should for the player. Generally, a bad idea.

It's certainly possible I missed, or have forgotten about, reports that Jeffers was begging for an extension and the Twins refused to pay him a reasonable amount. But it's not just automatically the Twins screwing up when there isn't an extension.

My problem is that there were no reports.  He might not have signed one, but I never heard that they tried.  This team is not good at extensions.

[IndianaTwin]

18 hours ago, DJL44 said:

Those are exactly the extensions the Twins are missing out on. Once the player “proves it”, they’re in arbitration already and too expensive.

I would like to see contract extensions for Taj Bradley, Luke Keaschall, Walker Jenkins, and Kaelen Culpepper this offseason.

I didn’t go back and look, but I suspect there was a “Should the Twins Extend Royce Lewis?” article after the 2023 season. Many would have been in favor. And Wallner could have been a candidate for a Kepler-level contract. 

Just a hunch, but I suspect TD would have even more comments about Royce if he was guaranteed, say, $8-$10M for several more years. Or about Wallner if he was guaranteed money in coming years.

[IndianaTwin]

1 hour ago, HarmonK03 said:

This roster was constructed by Falvey with help from Zoll.  Falvey didn't leave until right before spring training..  And the moves Zoll has made during the season have done nothing to improve the team.  Our record is worse since the trade deadline and he has carried Jackson on the roster for the last two months for no reason.

Are you suggesting Zoll hasn’t improved the bullpen?

[HarmonK03]

28 minutes ago, IndianaTwin said:

Are you suggesting Zoll hasn’t improved the bullpen?

Are you suggesting their record is better.  Zoll while not the final say helped build the roster last year that was 22 games under .500 and helped build the roster going into this season.  He made a couple of good trades at the deadline but he has made other moves that have not built off of that.  Thus our record is worse than at the deadline.

[DJL44]

38 minutes ago, IndianaTwin said:

I didn’t go back and look, but I suspect there was a “Should the Twins Extend Royce Lewis?” article after the 2023 season. Many would have been in favor. And Wallner could have been a candidate for a Kepler-level contract. 

Just a hunch, but I suspect TD would have even more comments about Royce if he was guaranteed, say, $8-$10M for several more years. Or about Wallner if he was guaranteed money in coming years.

There is always downside risk, but the earlier you sign the extension, the smaller the downside 

[chpettit19]

4 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

My problem is that there were no reports.  He might not have signed one, but I never heard that they tried.  This team is not good at extensions.

How many contract talks happen without ever being reported? I don't think "it wasn't reported so I'll assume it was never offered" is a good thought process. But to each their own.

I think this team is bad at developing players worthy of extensions. And I wish they'd do more pre-debut extensions. But I don't think they're significantly better or worse than the average MLB team at extensions in general. I think people overestimate how many extensions the average team does with guys pre-debut, pre-arbitration, or pre-free agency. I think the number is much, much lower than people realize. Especially for teams playing in the sort of budget waters the Twins play in.

[LA Vikes Fan]

22 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

He would have been roughly a 4 WAR player had he not broken his hamate bone.  Jeffers is the only FA catcher anywhere near this level so scarcity will be his friend.  I would guess 4/60.

I wish it would be 4/$60M. If I'm the Twins I get that done in a heartbeat. Jeffers will 6et at least 4/$70-75M, probably 4/$80M.

[DJL44]

6 minutes ago, LA Vikes Fan said:

I wish it would be 4/$60M. If I'm the Twins I get that done in a heartbeat. Jeffers will 6et at least 4/$70-75M, probably 4/$80M.

I am guessing 5/$75M. They will give him an extra season to spread out the luxury tax. 

[Mike Sixel]

6 hours ago, old nurse said:

Falvey wasn’t involved  in the 26 draft. 

Other than Houston, were any of those 26? Sorry, I missed one. 

[chpettit19]

11 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

Other than Houston, were any of those 26? Sorry, I missed one. 

I believe you mean Lackey, but your point is correct here. The players listed on the original comment were essentially all Falvey guys. Which is to be expected considering how long Zoll has been in charge. Would actually be quite noteworthy if he came in and turned over most of the roster and/or farm within half a season.

[Fatbat]

On 9/8/2026 at 7:40 AM, StiltedGopher said:

What is reasonable contract for Jeffers on the market?  Number of years might be more important than the dollars per year.  I don’t think Jeffers matches Cal Raleigh.  Younger but a bit less accomplished than JT Realmuto. $15-16 MM for 5 years?  I’d like to hear others speculate on the contract size.   You need more than one catcher and catchers do have future trade value - some team is always looking to add a catcher down the stretch so signing him has future options as well.  Twins said they want to compete.  They are worse in 2027 without Jeffers.  

If the Twins offered Jeffers 3 yrs $60M his agent would get him 6 years $125M from a big spending team. Anyone that thinks he will be a Twin next season is dreaming. 

[Mike Sixel]

10 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

I believe you mean Lackey, but your point is correct here. The players listed on the original comment were essentially all Falvey guys. Which is to be expected considering how long Zoll has been in charge. Would actually be quite noteworthy if he came in and turned over most of the roster and/or farm within half a season.

Ya. You wouldn't believe how off my brain was, is, right now....

[laloesch]

On 9/8/2026 at 10:13 AM, SteveLV said:

Here's a concept:  Sign him to an extension.  He likes the Twins, so pay the man like he deserves and end all the drama and angst.  He is a good, home-grown player. 

Ryan, on the other hand, wants to go home to California so should be traded in the off season.

And if the FO cannot or will not extend Jeffers, it was criminal negligence not to trade him before the trade deadline this year.

This.  Ryan should have been traded already.  He has already hinted his intentions to go home to California.

[TheLeviathan]

46 minutes ago, laloesch said:

This.  Ryan should have been traded already.  He has already hinted his intentions to go home to California.

100%.  He should've been dealt last year.  We'd be planning next year with Tolle and Arias in house if we had.  Possibly even a better deal.